陽陵泉 Yanglingquan
“Spring at the Yang Mound” · GB34
Foot Shaoyang · 34 of 44 · he-sea, lower-he-sea of the gallbladder, eight-influential point of sinew
Where. Below the outer knee, in the hollow just in front of and below the round knob of the fibula.
For. A bitter taste in the mouth; pain under the ribs; leg cramps.
Press. Steady fingertip pressure, about a minute each leg.
陽陵泉二穴，土也，在膝下一寸外廉陷中按 · Press with me
Six slow breaths
About a minute. Press as you breathe out, ease as you breathe in.
鄰 · Neighbouring leaves
Where Yanglingquan Sits Below the Outer Knee
The dataset locates Yanglingquan on the lateral aspect of the lower leg, in the depression anterior and inferior to the head of the fibula. Two everyday landmarks turn that sentence into something your fingers can hold. The first is the outer side of the knee itself: run a fingertip down from the outside of the kneecap region and, just below the level of the joint, you will meet a rounded bony prominence — the head of the fibula, the slender outer bone of the lower leg flaring into a small knob beneath the knee. The second landmark is the hollow that sits forward of and below that knob, where the taut structures of the joint give way to softer tissue. Notice what the record does not contain: no cun measurements at all. Location here is pure landmark language, which means it travels intact from body to body — the knob and the hollow belong to everyone.
What lies beneath the fingertips deserves gentle handling rather than force. The hollow marks the origin region of the long muscle that runs down the outer shin, draped over the bone. More quietly important, a superficial nerve — the common fibular nerve — winds around the narrow neck of the fibula just below the head, close enough to the surface that firm pressure there announces itself sharply. This is ordinary anatomy, not exotic lore, and it sets the tone for everything else on this page: the neighbourhood is busy, well-travelled, and best approached the way one approaches a sleeping cat. Light, patient contact reads the terrain perfectly well; pushing teaches nothing new and may complain loudly.
Orientation rounds out the picture. The knob is the mound; the point hides in the shallow ground in front of and below it, where the contour dips before the muscle belly gathers further down the shin. The gallbladder channel itself, having zigzagged down the side of the head and the body, passes through this lateral corridor on its long descent toward the fourth toe — which is why classical writers pictured the whole outer leg as yang territory, the sunlit side of the limb. The two legs are mirror images, and comparing them side by side is the fastest way to learn the landscape. A slight bend of the knee softens the tissues and lets the hollow open a little more invitingly.
A Self-Palpation Walkthrough
Sit upright on a firm chair with the feet resting flat, then let the knee on the side you are searching bend a little so the muscles around it soften. Starting on the outer thigh, walk your opposite hand’s fingertips downward across the wide flare of the femur, cross the natural crease of the knee, and continue onto the upper outer shin until you feel a distinct rounded knob of bone — the head of the fibula. Rest your fingers on it and confirm its shape by circling gently: a smooth dome, roughly thumb-pad sized, sitting below and slightly behind the plane of the kneecap. Once the knob is certain in your mind, slide the pad of your index or middle finger to its forward edge and let the fingertip settle forward and downward into the soft hollow you find there. Stay still for a few slow breaths before anything more. Repeat the entire search on the other side, so both legs receive the same patient attention.
Several quiet confirmations help before any real pressing begins. First comes sensation: touched feather-light, the true spot often yields a faint, dull awareness that drifts down the outer shin toward the ankle, while skin a finger-width away feels little — though responses vary from person to person, so treat the feeling as a hint rather than a verdict. Second comes the tissue test: straightening the knee draws the covering structures taut and makes the hollow shallower, while easing back into a soft bend deepens it again; the point should remain findable either way. Third comes comparison: the two sides should feel like twins, and a marked difference usually means the search drifted somewhere else. If your finger finds only bare bone, ease slightly forward and downward off the prominence and look again for the give of the hollow.
Failed searches stumble in familiar places. Landing too high puts the fingertip in the joint line itself, where femur, tibia, and fibula crowd together, feeling knotted and busy rather than softly hollow. Drifting too far behind the knob carries the search onto the corded territory at the back of the bone — the very neighbourhood of that superficial nerve, which is precisely why the record points the hollow forward and below instead. And searching during an acutely hot, swollen, or injured knee muddies every signal; set the exercise aside until the joint settles. All three slips resolve the same way: return to the rounded knob, retrace its forward rim, and drop down once, slowly.
Reading the Name: Spring at the Yang Mound
The name tells you how to see the spot. Yang 陽 names the bright, active, outward-facing aspect — and the outer surface of the leg belongs squarely to that side in classical mapping. Ling 陵 means mound or hill, and anyone who has just palpated the head of the fibula will recognise the joke: the bone really does rise like a small hill under the fingers. Quan 泉 is a spring, water rising out of the ground. Set them together and Yanglingquan reads as the spring beneath the yang mound — a well of moving moisture hidden at the foot of a sunny hill. Watery names cluster naturally among the he-sea family of points, because classical teaching pictures each channel’s qi, after cascading down the limb like streamwater, pooling deep and broad at the knee and elbow before flowing onward.
The record attaches three traditional offices to this one seat, and each adds a layer. First, it is the he-sea point of the gallbladder channel — the pool where that channel’s activity gathers nearest the trunk-end of the limb. Second, it serves as the lower-he-sea point of the gallbladder itself: classical theory assigned each of the six bowels a dedicated meeting pool on the lower limbs, and this point holds the office for the gallbladder, which is why digestive and rib-side complaints fill its historic portfolio. Third — and most famous — it stands among the eight influential points, a classical shortlist of sites where particular body constituents were said to converge. The constituent assigned here is sinew: the webbing of tendons, ligaments, and muscle-boundaries that classical anatomy gathered under one umbrella. To call GB34 the influential point of sinew is to say that, in the old frame, questions of stiffened, weakened, or cramped soft tissue gravitated toward this address.
Pinyin renders the name Yánglíngquán, and it carries a rare musical neatness: all three syllables ride the same second tone, rising — yang, ling, quan — so the name lifts as it is spoken, like water climbing out of the ground it came from. The hanzi 陽陵泉 are easy to memorise at a glance, and like many channel points named for landscape — wells, valleys, ravines, springs — the metaphor works as a compressed lesson in location and character. A mound with a spring at its foot: say the name slowly and your fingertip already knows where to go.
Traditional Indications, Explained
The recorded indications divide naturally into two families, and the first gathers around the mouth, the middle of the body, and the ribs: bitter taste in the mouth, hiccups, vomiting, hypochondriac pain, jaundice, and gallbladder disorders. In the traditional frame these belong together because the liver and gallbladder partner closely — wood-element colleagues whose free flow keeps digestion smooth and the rib-side relaxed. A bitter morning mouth, upward-stuck hiccups, or a tight, stuffed band along the lower ribs were all read as that flow snagging, and the gallbladder’s own pool-point stood high in classical discussions of remedies. Jaundice — the yellowing of skin and eyes — heads the list as a grave traditional concern, and honesty requires the modern aside at once: yellowing skin or eyes today calls for prompt medical assessment, full stop; it is a signal, never a self-care project.
The second family gathers in the legs and around the joints: atrophy and paralysis of the lower limbs, swollen painful knees, and muscle cramps. These flow directly from the point’s office as the influential point of sinew — the classical hub where matters of tightened, weakened, or wasted soft tissue were thought to convene. The old category of atrophy disorder covered progressive weakness and shrinking of the limbs in many grades, and channel practice reached for this pool-point when the trouble sat along the outer leg. Shoulder pain also appears in the record, an instance of the classical fondness for treating a distant complaint through a well-chosen far point on the same channel. Every item here is traditional bookkeeping — documented reasoning, not a promise that pressing the point resolves anything.
One recorded indication deserves its own careful sentence: hypertension appears among the traditional associations in the dataset. Blood pressure, however, is precisely the kind of matter that belongs under a clinician’s ongoing care, and nothing on this page should read as a way to manage it at home. Where modern research touches self-applied pressure generally, reviews suggest effects are modest and heavily context-dependent, and evidence tied to any single point remains thin. Hold the traditional list the way a museum holds an instrument: admire the craft, learn the reasoning, decline to mistake the display for the workshop.
Self-Care Acupressure at Home
With the point found by the walkthrough above, settle in: seated, spine tall but unforced, the searched leg’s foot flat and knee softly bent. Bring the pads of your index and middle fingers — never the tips, never a knuckle — onto the hollow. Begin with simple contact for a few breaths, letting the area accustom itself to being noticed, then add small, slow circles so the skin glides over the tissue beneath. Pressure should register as pleasant dullness or a faint spreading warmth down the outer shin, never sharpness, never electricity. A comfortable home rhythm is one to three minutes per side, once or twice daily, ideally matched to slow exhales so each circle rides the breath out. Finish by swapping hands and giving the other leg the same unhurried minute, keeping the two sessions symmetrical.
Quality outranks quantity every time. Light, patient, regularly repeated contact is the whole art of self-acupressure as this page practises it; hard jabbing at a nerve-rich hollow achieves nothing except teaching your nervous system to distrust the game. Warm your hands first on cold days, because chilled tissue guards itself. Pick a quiet corner over a screen, and let the practice double as a pause: inhale through the nose, soften the knee, press gently on the long exhale. People who keep routines often anchor them to existing habits — after brushing teeth, before an evening walk — because consistency is what self-care traditions actually ask for, and this point rewards regularity far more than intensity.
Keep the honest scope in view throughout. Self-applied pressure is a comfort practice: it may leave the leg feeling looser, the afternoon less tense, the pause genuinely restful — or it may change nothing beyond giving you ninety seconds of attention on your own body, which is already worth the minute. What it never becomes, on this page, is escalation: pressing harder, longer, or sharper to force a result, especially in a hollow with a superficial nerve running through it. If curiosity pulls toward force, return to gentleness or close the day’s session early. The practice succeeds when it stays kind.
Cautions and Safe Practice
An unusual feature of this point’s record deserves explaining up front: the dataset lists no specific caution for GB34 — no warning line of the kind that shadows the chest points, where deep professional techniques risk serious harm. Empty, however, is not the same as permissive. It records that classical and clinical literature attached no special warning to this site, not that all force is welcome here. The geography argues for gentleness regardless: the common fibular nerve hugs the bone close by, and the knee joint itself sits just overhead. Professional techniques at this site belong to trained hands operating under their own rules; home practice answers with something simpler — staying on the surface, always.
The practical rules follow. Use finger pads only, with pressure that never exceeds pleasant dullness. Skip the point entirely over broken, irritated, or rashy skin, around a freshly twisted or swollen knee, and while any acute flare of the joint is hot and unhappy; after knee surgery, wait until a clinician clears ordinary activity before resuming. Sharp, electric, or radiating sensation means stop at once — that is the nearby nerve introducing itself — and the point stays closed for the rest of the day. Pregnant readers, and anyone living with a chronic condition or taking regular medication, should check with a qualified practitioner before adding any new point practice to their week. None of these rules is a burden; together they are what lets a tiny daily ritual stay harmless.
And the wider frame stands over everything: this page is educational, and acupressure is self-care — comfort and attention, not diagnosis or therapy. Seek prompt medical care, not a pressure routine, for jaundice or any yellowing of skin or eyes, for persistent vomiting or a bitter taste that will not lift, for a hot swollen knee, for leg weakness that is progressing, and for any symptom that frightens you. Persistent complaints belong with a licensed practitioner — medical or East Asian medical as suits the picture. The spring-at-the-mound image is lovely, but the safest gift Yanglingquan offers most people is acquaintance: a fingertip-level friendship with the quiet architecture below the outer knee, treated kindly.
Yanglingquan, the Spring at the Yang Mound, waits in the hollow forward and below the head of the fibula, tucked beneath the outer knee. Classical practice honoured it as the gathering place of the sinews and reached for it in bitter taste, rib-side tightness, and stiff, cramping legs. This guide walks through finding it by touch and pressing it gently within clear limits.
Self-care limits
Frequently asked
- How do I find Yanglingquan without knowing anything about cun?
- You barely need measurements at all — this record is built on landmarks. Slide your fingers down the outer side of the knee until you meet a rounded knob of bone, the head of the fibula. Then move to its forward rim and settle your fingertip forward and downward into the soft hollow just below the prominence. Knob first, hollow second: that sequence is the whole method, and it repeats identically on both legs.
- Is pressing it safe, given that a nerve passes nearby?
- Light, surface-level fingertip pressure is generally reasonable self-care for healthy adults, and the hollow the dataset describes actually steers you away from the nerve’s corded territory behind the bone. Respect the feedback loop: tingling, electricity, or a sharp zing means the nerve is speaking — stop immediately and leave the point alone for the day. Gentle dullness is the intended conversation; anything louder ends the session.
- What did classical practice use Yanglingquan for?
- The traditional record groups its uses in two families: mouth-and-middle complaints — bitter taste, hiccups, vomiting — alongside hypochondriac pain, jaundice, and gallbladder disorders; and sinew-and-leg matters — weak or wasted lower limbs, swollen painful knees, muscle cramps — plus shoulder pain and hypertension in the historical lists. Its standing rests on three offices: he-sea point of the channel, lower-he-sea of the gallbladder, and the influential point of sinew. These are documented traditions, not treatment promises.
- Why is it called the influential point of the sinews?
- Classical teaching kept a shortlist of eight influential points — single sites where fundamental body constituents, such as the organs, vessels, marrow, or sinew, were said to gather. Sinew, in that older anatomy, meant the whole working web of tendons, ligaments, and muscle boundaries. Assigning that constituency to GB34 made it the natural first address in classical discussions of stiffened, cramped, or weakened soft tissue — a conceptual hub, much loved in the literature, rather than a modern laboratory claim.
- Can pressing this point replace seeing a doctor?
- No, and the point’s own record says why. Jaundice, stubborn vomiting, a bitter taste that persists, a hot swollen knee, or advancing leg weakness are all signals that deserve professional assessment promptly — some urgently. Think of self-acupressure and medicine as different rooms: daily comfort practice lives downstairs, and the consulting room upstairs opens when symptoms persist, worsen, or frighten you. Neither room replaces the other, and knowing which door to use is part of practising safely.
Sources
- 01WHO Standard Acupuncture Point Locations in the Western Pacific Region (2008), World Health Organization — nomenclature conventions.
- 02A Manual of Acupuncture, Peter Deadman, Mazin Al-Khafaji and Kevin Baker — point-name tradition, he-sea and lower-he-sea theory, and the eight influential points.
- 03aijiu-mpvue (MIT License) licensed dataset, entry for GB34 Yanglingquan — location, point class, actions, and the empty caution record.
Last reviewed
牌記This leaf, for machines
Old books ended with a colophon saying who printed them. Every leaf here carries the same facts as structured data for agents and search, with no layout in the way.
- GET /en/points/gb34/leaf.json
- GET /zh-hant/points/gb34/leaf.json
- GET /zh-cn/points/gb34/leaf.json
- /llms.txt — the index of every leaf
- JSON-LD in the page: MedicalWebPage, MedicalEntity and FAQPage
{
"id": "GB34",
"name": {
"en": "Yanglingquan",
"gloss": "Spring at the Yang Mound",
"zh-Hant": "陽陵泉",
"zh-Hans": "阳陵泉"
},
"channel": {
"id": "GB",
"order": 34,
"of": 44
},
"location": {
"text": "Below the outer knee, in the hollow just in front of and below the round knob of the fibula."
},
"for": [
"A bitter taste in the mouth",
"pain under the ribs",
"leg cramps"
],
"press": {
"text": "Steady fingertip pressure, about a minute each leg.",
"seconds": 60,
"sides": "both"
},
"cautions": [],
"source": "Tongren Shuxue Zhenjiu Tujing, book 5",
"url": "https://acupoints.com/en/points/gb34",
"lastReviewed": "2026-08-24"
}